Not that it takes much encouragement, but, as it's Sunday night and I don't have to report to work for at least another 10 hours, I'm pleased to enjoy an extra whisky in honour of the 250th birthday of Robert Burns:

About 4.2 million Canadians claim heritage ties to Scotland, so it's no surprise that there are a dozen statues erected to Burns across the country. After all, Canada's first two prime ministers were Scots.

I'm one of those. My dad's dad hailed from Edinburgh; my mom's dad sailed from Greenock, near Glasgow, a month before the Titanic left Southampton and arrived in Halifax a few days after Titanic was supposed to have arrived in New York.

And yet, though I feel a powerful attraction and fondness for the land of my ancestors, I've never been there! (Je suis né à Montréal!) Perhaps that will change in 2009. In the meantime, I'm told - perhaps best in "Scotland's Story" by The Proclaimers (left) -- Scotland is not just for white guys who like fried food.

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